


Shackled

by Eagefrien



Series: Scaretober 2019 [7]
Category: Mystery Skulls Animated
Genre: Gen, because shes dumb and played with handcuffs, cayenne gets chained to a fence, fear of dogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:48:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24338389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eagefrien/pseuds/Eagefrien
Summary: Cayenne didn't sign up for this
Relationships: Belle & Cayenne & Paprika (Mystery Skulls Animated), cayenne & belle & paprika & lewis (Mystery skulls animated)
Series: Scaretober 2019 [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1756990
Kudos: 8





	Shackled

Cayenne yanks her wrist away, pulling hard against the dingy and rusted handcuffs. Her face twisted by anger and her eyes welling with tears. 

“God-! Dammit-! _Fucking-! OPEN-!!_ She shouts, kicking the metal fence in time with the anger swelling inside of her. 

Fury swelled within her, growing so intense and immense she shook in her boots. 

Not only that, she threw her headband. The fact that it was in the dirt now and not in her hair was truly the icing on the cake. 

_A meteor better hit right now and hit Belle in her big stupid face!_ Cayenne grits her teeth and shakes against the handcuff again. 

To absolutely no avail. Instead, they locked tighter around her small wrist. If Paprika wasn’t sitting right there, Cayenne would have screamed.

“’Yenne..?” Paprika’s small voice piques above Cayennes mental storm of curses, and she flinches under the sudden sink eye of Cayennes fury.

 _”What?”_

Paprika swallows, cringing at the sight of Cayennes growing welts. There’s one clean slice that she can see- clear as day! And it had her sick. 

Forcing down her queasiness, Paprika frightfully produces a small _First Aid Kit_ from her pocket, and pulls out all of the small, colorful bandages covered in spongebob and Dora and ghosts. 

Cayenne stares at it dumbly, “… What?” 

Paprika _forces_ a big smile, “We can cover your arm so the … rings don’t hurt as bad!”

Cayenne couldn’t help glaring, even if it lessened dramatically, the rage was still there, _still enough to kill a grown man if one tries to grab one of them-_

Nervous by Cayennes silence, Paprika hides his chin in her frills, “A-are you mad that these are Belle’s…?”

Jolting, Cayenne’s teeth grit, _”Well NOW I am!”_

_How DARE she pit Paprika against her? Use their sweet, innocent little sister to get into her good graces! Belle could have given them to her **herself!**_

“I don’t want them. Where are yours?”

Paprika blushes, averting her gaze, and whispers quietly, _”I gave all of mine away…”_

It then hit Cayenne how much of a serial bandaid giver Paprika was.

“Where are yours ‘Yenne?” 

Now it’s Cayenne’s turn to be the target of her own frustration, and with a bigger sigh, she grumbles, “I don’t got it on me.” 

“Why not? Your kit is suppose to keep you safe-“

“Yeah? Where am I supposed to keep it ‘Rika? I wear a _DRESS!_ Dresses don’t have pockets!”

That was a bold faced lie, Lewis always took plenty of time out of his day to sew pockets in all of their articles of clothing. 

Not that Paprika needed to know that.

 _And it worked too,_ Cayenne thinks triumphantly as Paprika frowned to herself and retracts into herself like a turtle- no longer even looking at Cayenne as she undoubtedly thinks to herself.

_Why did Belle get the phone? Why couldn’t she or Paprika get one? Belle doesn’t even use hers! She just went and ran to find Lewis or mama. It’s bullshit!_

Cayenne growls and pouts, trying to cross her arms but unable to. Instead settling for her arm folded across her chest.

Neither of them paying mind to the backyard Cayenne was attached to.

The sounds of a door unlocking and a _stampede_ pounding against the ground was was what finally got them to even look up. 

And _shriek_.

Cayenne is yanking her arm back, wrist slicing against the handcuffs even more- but that didn’t matter. What mattered was the several _dogs_ staring at them. 

“Cayenne!!” Paprika shoves herself in between Cayenne and the fence, arms outstretched. But her protection only came so far. The dogs- large bulldogs and sharp eared _beasts_ race directly to them. Cayennes heart beating out of her chest and taking her line of sight. 

“Whoa! _EY! Bacchus! Venus! Neptune! Get back here!”_

Paprika gasps, finally noticing a short- green clad…. lady? Man? Bolting across the expansive lawn, leashes in hand and in seconds, was upon the herd.

And as if by a shine of luck shining down on them- a familiar man came into view out of the corner of Paprika’s eye

“Cayenne! Paprika!” Lewis’s voice boomed with panic, and he’s running along the dirt road to get to them.

“Hey!” Paprika giggles nervously, glancing up at her sister, “Lew is here, he’ll-“

Cayennes eyes were blank, her body had gone slack. Simply sitting there and leaning back, stiff as a board. 

Frozen, Paprika didn’t know if she was dead or was asleep, but despite the beasts clawing at the fence still, she stared between Cayenne and Lewis rapidly approaching. 

“C-Cayenne..?” Paprika whispers under her breath, tears beginning to well in her eyes as it dawns upon her that _she failed to keep her sister safe. She failed and-_

“Pap’,” Lewis is there, on his knee and looking from Cayenne to Paprika and to the new adult that Paprika couldn’t recognize, “Sweetheart, what happened?” 

“Ca- cay..! She’s.. she’s de-“ Paprika mumbles, a rush of words not coming out correctly and making her sound dumber than she was already. Lewis didn’t rush her, watching her carefully and calmly. A hand on her shoulder and the other on Cayennes face. _He’s bringing her back-! Thank you Lew-_

“Oh hey, Lewis. These your kids or something?”

Paprika whips her head back, staring up into large- swirly colored goggles. The kind you would see only from a villain. Shaking, Paprika backs away into Cayenne again, who is simply sitting there and leaning back, her arm straight out and held up by her bruising wrist.

“No, sisters-“ Lewis replies, not even looking at them, gently pushes Paprika out of the way and wrapped an arm around Cayennes back, cradling her close and lessening the distance in which she hung, “Chloe, do you know what happened? Why is she handcuffed-?” One of the dogs with a shiny coat jumps at the fence, startling Lewis and Chloe shouts. 

“OI! Go play. Back up, Nep.” 

The dog whines sadly, trying to jump again and press their nose to the fence, snuffed right against Cayennes fingers-

 _”NEPTUNE!”_ With a quick flick, the enormous dog- reduced to a puddle of whining and obedience- falls to the ground, overly dramatic and laying there. Chloe stares at the doggy, before shrugging and returning to Lewis and Cayenne. 

“…. how is she asleep?” 

“She’s afraid of dogs!” Paprika says, a bit too loudly than she meant, before she remembered something else, “We- we’re sorry miss! We didn’t mean to get stuck. Our sister dared her and-“

Lewis’s head snaps over to her, “ _Excuse_ me?”

Chloe, on the other hand, barks out a laugh, “Kidding right? Sweet. Hold on, let’s get your sis out before you yell at em.”

Lewis nods briefly, paying more attention to Cayenne and less the how Chloe quickly ran back into her house.

Paprika couldn’t help but shake in her rain boots (which still earned befuddled looks from passerbyers), even more so when Lewis turns to her. No anger lingers on his face, merely concern. 

_He just doesn’t wanna scare you! He doesn’t like scaring anyone!_ Paprika reminds herself, and steeled herself for the interrogations like she saw on tv.

“Pap’, what do you mean she was dared to do this?”

Stiffening, Paprika averts her gaze and keeps it on the ground, staring at a pebble. Slowly, she opens her mouth and brings herself to talk.

“We… we’re trying to test our courage..” her hearts hammering against her chest, mind running rampant as it finally hits her that it took that much to squeeze just that out! What if they get in trouble? “Belle… I dared Cayenne to do it!” 

…

“… You did?” Lewis asks, quirking an eyebrow and staring directly into her soul, picking apart the threads and exposing her. _He always had the power to do that…!_

“Y-yeah! She dared me to swallow a worm!” 

“Did she now?” _Oh no he doesn’t believe me!_ Fists tightening, Paprika willed herself to do the only thing she thought could possibly make Lewis believe her.

And began describing how the worm in _super-duper_ detail. Everything she could even vaguely remember about worms she brought up again and again, running out of breath and making herself gasp only to keep going. 

Lewis’s expression stayed the exact same. 

At some point, Cayenne woke up too.

And Chloe returned. Not the doggies though (which was nice), they were sitting in a small little hole they dug out.

Chloe’s hands working quickly over the handcuff, shoving a wire (a pin? She has one of those!) and was twisting it. And with a click, Cayennes bruised and scratched up wrist was free! 

Chloe interrupts Paprika’s story, smiling down at Cayenne- who still hadn’t made an effort to move away from Lewis’s protective hold- “There you go, kid, hope you don’t get stuck again. That’ll be a bitc-“

_”Chloe!”_

“Yeesh, sorry.” Grumbling, she stands up and readjusts her goggles, “well, imma yeet. See you guys later~” 

And with that, she completely vanished.

…

“Pap’,” Cayenne finally says, irate and rubbing her wrist, “why the fuck did you think Lew would believe that?”

_”-!! CAYENNE-!”_


End file.
